SALT LAKE CITY — The late Sen. John McCain might have had some words about President Donald Trump's tweets and remarks that some have called racist about four Democratic congresswomen of color.
But Cindy McCain, the Arizona Republican's wife, said she makes it a habit not to comment on anything the president says, nor would she speculate on how her husband would have responded.
A noted Trump critic, John McCain died a year ago next month from an aggressive form of brain cancer.
Some political observers see Utah GOP Sen. Mitt Romney as filling John McCain's role as a counterbalance to Trump.
"He's a wonderful senator. I'm so proud of him and Ann. He's doing a great job in the Senate. I think he's a good, stong moderate voice, and that's needed right now," Cindy McCain said in a brief interview.
Cindy McCain was in Salt Lake City on Thursday to speak at the National Governors Association's summer meeting about Arizona's efforts to combat human trafficking. About half of the nation's governors gathered for the three-day event at the Grand America Hotel.
McCain called selling children for sex a "scourge" and "epidemic" that happens not just overseas, but in neighborhoods across the United States. Also, she said it's not just an immigration issue.
"In Salt Lake City, it's happening right outside the front door of this hotel," she said.
Financier and accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein made headlines recently because of his past association with Trump and former President Bill Clinton. Epstein, 66, allegedly paid girls as young as 14 to have sex with him at his home in New York and his estate in Palm Beach, Florida, between 2002 and 2005.
Epstein is currently in jail in Manhattan awaiting trial. He faced similar accusations in Florida in 2007 but reached a plea deal with prosecutors that allowed him to avoid federal charges and plead guilty to lesser state prostitution charges.
McCain said "there couldn't be a nicer guy to be jail" and that Epstein's case has heightened the issue.
"Now we have to talk about this because it's mainstream," said McCain, chairwoman of the Human Trafficking Advisory Council at Arizona State University's McCain Institute of Leadership.
Human trafficking is neither a partisan nor a political issue, she said.
"Anyone that wants to bring politics into this is just damn wrong," McCain said.
Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes aggressively fights human trafficking through education campaigns, support of anti-human trafficking legislation, victim recovery and advocacy. The office conducted 49 human trafficking investigations, prosecuted eight cases and helped 44 victims last year.
Reyes also initiated the Utah Trafficking in Persons task force.
Arizona hosting the Super Bowl in 2008 was the catalyst for McCain getting involved in human trafficking prevention. Selling children for sex often occurs around large-scale events, but goes underreported, she said. McCain said she didn't want to see the state embarrassed. She pulled together a group of friends in her living room to talk about how to combat it.
With state government involvement, McCain said, Arizona has expanded efforts to end human trafficking and support victims. Gov. Doug Ducey renewed the Arizona Human Trafficking Council indefinitely in 2015.
Arizona has increased penalties on traffickers and the law can no longer describe a child as a prostitute. First responders are now taught to recognize what they're seeing, McCain said.
"Kids are victims," she said. "They're not criminals."
Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson said his rural state has never hosted the Super Bowl but "we have truck stops." Truck drivers in Arkansas are required to take a human trafficking education course, he said. Educators, too, undergo mandatory continuing education on how to recognize and respond to human trafficking.
"I think this is helpful to draw attention to the challenge of human trafficking and sex trafficking as well in these areas that can be utilized for an evil purpose," he said.
McCain said education on combatting human trafficking needs to go all the way down to elementary schoolchildren.
"This is not sex education," she said. "This is safety."